Project Title

Fostering a Teachers’ Community of Practice mediated by an emerging CSCL tool



Overview

This project is a design-based research study of a new CSCL technology to build Communities of Practice amongst teachers and researchers. This study combines two research strands: Fostering a CoP-based mediated by an emerging CSCL (enhanced email technology). With the rapid pace of change, teachers are hard pressed to keep up with new developments in their profession. The CoP is recognized to be an effective approach for teachers’ professional development through self-paced sharing of experiences and knowledge. However building successful CoPs have remained a challenge. This project studies the design issues related to building successful CoP using a new email-centric system referred to as XMAIL. This is a study of a leveraged approach to the adoption of enhanced IT functionalities added onto an already-familiar tool. Given their heavy workload, teachers are hard pressed to find time to learn new tools and technologies. As a result, IT adoption in the schools may not have progressed much beyond widespread use of email and word processing. This project will investigate whether the enhanced functionalities are conducive to the cultivation of the Community of Practice.

Project Reference

LSL 4/05 LCK